Best of

the Twin Cities

Best Kickstarter

Travail Kitchen and Amusements

Successfully funded on October 10, 2013, just hours after it was launched, Travail's $75,000 Kickstarter raised a whopping $255,669 toward building a brand new restaurant — and raised a few eyebrows along with it. The wildly successful campaign set off a debate on the value of crowd-funding for-profit restaurants, even garnering a note in a New York Times article on the subject. Meanwhile, Travailians had already taken the money and run, pushing forward on their plans to create a new building from scratch, one designed to better encourage their passion for creative food and their ingenious "hacking" of fine dining. In February, Travail 2.0 opened alongside its sister concept, the Rookery, and guests flooded the grand opening, excited to see what the team had up their sleeves. It was a triumphant day that never would have happened without a little help from their friends... or, well, the internet.